Stripped Twilight
by Foxes' Dreams
Summary: A tragedy usually determines people to get back on the wished track. Fatally and indissolubly united by the idea of saving a child's life, Chase and Cameron seem to be floating in the cloud of reverie, where their thoughts are finally in synch. Inspired by 6x05 "Instant Karma".


Stripped Twilight

T.V. Show: House MD

Pairing: Chase/Cameron

Author: Foxes' Dreams

Summary: A tragedy usually determines people to get back on the wished track. Fatally and indissolubly united by the idea of saving a child's life, Chase and Cameron seem to be floating in the cloud of reverie, where their thoughts are finally in synch. Inspired by 6x05 "Instant Karma".

* * *

It was the fine precision of intent that kept them on the correct trajectory, until it wasn't.

The loud shrill of the pagers signaled another urgent emergency, the fluctuations of adversity flowing freely in Cameron's mind. Her feet were trembling terribly; they were fighting to resist and carry her own mass. The forever echo of a warrior pounded in her head as she headed straight to the critical patient's room.

She has never been particularly attached to patient, but to this feathery-haired, blue-eyed child, she felt an odd affection she couldn't quite describe. For the first time, her freedom and integrity of the soul was threatened to shatter alongside with the little boy's life.

She entered the reserve at top speed, finding Foreman standing over the excruciatingly seizing body, signaling that the situation was even worse than suspected. The frosty thralldom of sensitivity left her and promptly went to the side of the bed, to start the standard procedures to save another innocent life.

Cameron was propelled by the prospect of that fragile, tiny body, convulsing on the verge of apparently imminent death, who deserved a second chance to live at full intensity.

"Intracranial pressure is eight. We need to relieve pressure or his brain will herniate," Cameron announced, while attentively registering what the delta lines were showing.

"This isn't an epileptic seizure as we thought. We need to book an OR stat!" Foreman concluded, keeping a collected mask of demeanor even if he was under considerable pressure."Page Chase to meet us in the emergency OR. I'll call the neurosurgical team to make a brief consult before," he said breathlessly, while pulling the gurney towards the surgical block where the only chance of survival stood, waiting.

Cameron stopped to fumble for her pager, but in the same time, she felt as though she was going on the maniacal road of dissolution where even the golden riot of autumn leaves darkened permanently.

The grotesque nightmare of a haunting fear overwhelmed her momentarily as she sent the emergency report to Chase. Soon after, she ran, as quickly as her feet could sustain her.

The target was set. She only needed to defeat death and time in a battle where conquering circumstances was crucial.

Cameron needed to avoid the inconsequential nothing.

* * *

Cameron headed towards the OR after having changed herself in a pair of light-pink scrubs, her skin felt completely oppressed with a confused sense of cumbrous material. She still felt the outweighing minutes of sorrow and bitterness pervading her soul, leaving her painfully numb.

She entered the sterile room forcefully, the sharp contrast of chemical aromas sending a momentary rush of adrenaline even in the most remote chambers of her brain.

Chase was preparing to start the first incision since the child needed a stunt to relieve the pressure.

"5 mg of Lorazepam to stop the seizures," Chase commanded urgently, painfully aware of the battle against the rational law of nature.

Cameron stood closely by his side, monitoring his wisest and most precise movements, her breath completely obstructed by the tight knot of stress that formed almost instantly.

"Drill with diameter of 5 millimeters," He ordered again, the resolute volume of his voice shattering the silence into a paraphernalia of unleashed tension where even the slightest deviation of trajectory could be utmost lethal.

Chase placed attentively the drill in the narrow support, and even with his serious and endless years of training under pressure, he felt over and over the paroxysms of grief and longing submerging him.

Breath hitched, palms rigid and with sticky sweat-filled brow, he still waited for a significant change, his eyes were painfully glued to the noisily beeping monitor, which still signaled the epicenter of the disaster.

Overshadowed by a profound and vague desolation, Chase browsed all his past meticulous knowledge to draw similarities from.

"ICP is 9 and holding," Cameron said desperately, her own voice cracking with emotion, even though she was pelted with an interminable torrent of medical hypothesis, all amalgaming in her head.

"We need to explore all the reasons why the pressure isn't relieved," he concluded quickly, reaching for a sterile bandage to cover the bleeding wound, which pervaded the air with a metallic smell of death.

Cameron stood poised, pertinent to the threads of discussion, hopelessly trying to detect the cause of the complex reaction. Pervasive silence which wrapped them in a mantle of unknown content overwhelmed the room momentarily. Millions of possible ideas conquered her mind, even though deep down she knew only one can annihilate the brooding and everlasting emergency situation.

"An aneurism or clot is the best shots right now," Chase said quickly, his hand still tightly applied to the child's head, as though he was able to resurrect him within a temporal limit. He was overhung and overspread with ivy, but giving up wasn't even worth mentioning.

"We don't have time to do an angiogram to rule them out. Something might be blocking the CSF flow. This also explains why the stunt isn't working," Cameron highly debated, putting all her willpower into this differential, even though her tone was platitudinous and pompously sentimental.

 _Instruct yourself to think_

Chase remembered this doctrine since early childhood, since he was placated by doom. And at that moment, the mind finally relocked and the final diagnosis freely took form, and appeared promptly.

"I need an ultrasound machine," he stated, while running to gather the supply leaving the faith of this fragile child in the hands of the destiny for a brief, but vital moment.

"What are you doing? There's no point in -," Cameron tried to infer herself in the wild whirl of guesses even though she was plumbing in her own fear where poignant doubts and misgivings were ever present.

"I'm confirming Arnold-Chiari syndrome. It has a higher probability to appear at children, and all his symptoms fit," Chase replied utterly confident and motivated, the power of his intellectual metamorphosis overtaking him completely.

"Even if you are right, that means he's already in stage 2, balancing from a 7 to 10 millimeter mass," Cameron argued back, pressing cares obviously absorbing her into darkness. "There might not be anything we can do," she whispered brokenly, plaudits of the unlettered mob influencing her fearful voice.

"Nothing is impossible until I see it!" He exclaimed forcefully, his actions were precipitated into mysterious depths of greatness in front of such case. Chase was propelled to aid, so he searched for the tumor continuously and anxiously. And as a wonderful privilege, it appeared on the small, flat screen.

"There it is! 7 mm mass right near the brain stem," Chase said, proclaiming with joyous defiance the possible defeat of death which utterly surprised him.

"Chase," Cameron interfered promptly and somehow accusatory,"it's invasive to try to remove such a tumor. He might as well become seriously brain damaged!" She had no slight intention to see another soul dematerializing suddenly, but all the encounters she had with death and mourn had left behind her provocative with bitter hostility.

"So we don't go on the traditional way," he said in reply, profound and chilling solitude of the place sending a momentary shiver passing his spine, as he witnessed Cameron's face shifting from sullen grief to hope and from realization to confusion. "We make a slight incision in the spinal cord to relieve the pressure, similar to the one done when we administer ampicilin directly. Then, we remove the tumor by going through her upper lip, as it's advisable for a patient with Crohn's," he concluded eagerly, his voice as hopeful as possible, proving once more his determination and imperturbability.

Cameron had tears stinging at the back of her eyes, but forced herself to choke back the rising wave of emotions. "It might work," she whispered quietly, quickened and enriched by the new contract of life and truth.

Chase flashed her a boyish grin of reassurance, and went to announce a professional neurological team for further assistance. He was poised to suffer and pray alongside with the power of fate to save the innocent life laying still. He felt quiet drawn to the blond-haired boy in a personal way, prodigious boldness and energy of the intellect continuously teaching him to care and to stay.

Cameron breathed in the gruesome view one last time and left as she obsessively needed fresh gulp of oxygen to calm her throbbing nerves. Her hands were still quivering with restraint grief, a slight show of female instincts guiding her momentarily.

Hours later, she found herself remorselessly swept in the oblivion while standing on one on-call flexible beds she found extremely uncomfortable. Redolent of the night lamp, she drifted off in thought more deeply, waiting for hours to pass unseen. Another rudely reminder of life's serious issues crashed near her, but she wasn't willing anymore to sacrifice or to cry soundlessly.

For a second, all her shattered pieces took form again, and she sensed that only one long lost hole was still empty.

* * *

Cameron didn't know how much time she spent in the deserted chamber, staring blankly in the darkened space, hoping to spare herself from another dose of mental madness or sheer tension.

Through a cycle of many ages as being a doctor, she had never been involved with the patient's condition, but ever since the rocky beginning, the verge of death seemed abominable. Nobody looked for her in the chain of hours, but she didn't want to be disturbed from the restless and temporary slumber, she was actually willing to drown in the chilling and shadowy sentiment that unaccountably crept over. She was painfully aware that Chase was in the OR, probably suffering himself for such a delicate and apparently heart striking case.

Thoughts came thronging in panic haste, a transcendental contempt for death overwhelming her momentarily. And just as Cameron seemed to have lost control of her throbbing emotions, the door creaked open, a soft ray of light temporarily blinding her, shocking even her most remote and inner senses.

"Surgery's done. Kid's in the NICU, in reserve 4," the ghostly trace of a nurse announced promptly with diplomacy and impersonality in her voice. Cameron only nodded courtly, but her silence transformed into an overmastering passion as soon as she processed the information. For the first time after dense, oppressive anxiety, twilight crept upon the darkening mind.

Then, she started running again.

* * *

Sunk into darkened reverie, Cameron arrived in the ICU unit, only to find the embodied splendor before her eyes. Chase was sitting near the motionless boy; still wearing his sweat soaked and fluidly stained scrubs, stroking the boy's pure blonde curls.

Cameron detected the hollow ring of fundamental essential, seeing her husband being so purely affectionate towards the little child, after the deadly closure to a desperate, ultimate resolve. She flushed crimson and went deep into her futuristic imagination where all her previously impossible dreams were taking a lively contour.

Chase turned momentarily, choreographed to stare back at her blankly, an impish, satisfied spread across his face. She was struck surprised by his sudden gush of optimism, after such a narrow closure to the imminent finality.

He was utterly glowing, just like he did years ago before he had openly expressed his deep-hidden feelings towards her profoundly damaged soul.

"I assume the surgery went well," She chirped tiredly, as she made the first decisive and uninterrupted steps in the sterile-ordered chamber, provoking another wave of angst to unfold.

"As great as it could," Chase responded eagerly, acting with chivalrous delicacy of honor which he had attained after such an unexpected turnabout.

"He doesn't have any brain damage?" Cameron inquired incredulously, the invisible divine influence marking not only a virtual blessing, but also an epiphany that forever changed Cameron's perspective.

"Not even a trace of it. His delta status is normal and his brain responded normally to all the applied stimuli," Chase said, sighing deeply, from a kind of mental depletion, smoothening away all the quickening sensibilities. "Everything is okay," He announced proudly, all his hurrying thoughts clamored utterance.

Before he could even primarily react, Cameron's face was lit by a supernatural glow of inspiration and resolve, her deep-blue eyes were limpid and her beauty softened by an air of pure indolence and languor. She grabbed his sides' unceremoniously, clinging into him like the utter final salvation, her heart appearing to be abdicating the sorrow and pain and focused dearly on the present. Her limbs ran to marble, began completely numbed by an uncharacteristic pleasure of togetherness.

His response was eager, opposite to the interior solitude and enveloped her in the same tight lock of joined bodies, his proud warmth transferring instantly to her previously shaking body, palletized by tained tragedy.

With a half-smile creating forced dimples in his cheeks, he buried his drained face in her balmy, musing scent, where time stood exactly still and uncertainty dissolved. His mind was utterly dazed and wandering in a deep mist of memories, remobilizing the scenario of love alongside with its monumental moments.

Cameron's ardent lips were placed closely to his responsive ears; her passions vented themselves with sneers and loud huffs. Her soul was compressed into a single agony of prayer, but desire came as invincible instincts and words were expressed. "You would be a great father," She said simply, but thoroughly, loud enough to crumble the unsteadiness of their relationship to ashes.

Chase's ragged breath contracted to a sharp inhale, his pulse leaped anew to an erratic rhythm, impossible and exhilarating to control. His shrewd, intense gaze was appraisingly fixed upon her, the soft and caustic stare galloping to sides synchronizing with his throbbing thoughts.

"I thought I had given up on that dream," Chase admitted sincerely, his vagrant thoughts flowing freely in the conversation after years of hiding behind professionalism.

"What made you change your mind?" Cameron asked, her voice unusually thick with internal protest at the vision of knowing the genuine answer.

Instead of promptly replying, he traced the rosiness of her high cheekbone, looking like the foreboding of some destined change, utterly vulnerable. Lowering his head cautiously, sensually slow, he whispered a simple, monosyllabic word, which possessed an ineffable splendor.

 _You_

* * *

A haunting and horrible sense of insecurity was lingering in the stuffy atmosphere of their small, but coquette bedroom. A heavy oppression seemed to brood upon the air, compressing the wave of sudden change into acrid, metallic smells of dust granules.

Cameron was wandering in the kitchen, a lapse from the well-ordered days of analytic and nervous cleaning used as a relief starting to form. The clock was ticking profoundly rhythmic and programmed, so she kept a careful eye on it, measuring and seeing how minutes transformed into passing seconds.

She was neither anxious nor propelled by panicky energy; she just waited patiently for a particular moment, to put essential things into an order that had ominously been lacking.

The aromatic sense of herbs combined with fruity, exotic flavors, intoxicated her with a haze resembled to an oasis of relaxation, as the tea pot startled her back into consciousness. Cameron removed the rattling object from the enveloping warmth of the stove, in a refined attempt to relax her treacherous feelings with a steaming hot cup of oriental tea.

She was wrapped in the same murmur of anticipation, probably caused by the new marvel of the sky, carefully welcoming the brooding, phantomlike moonlight.

The sound of the front door being appraisingly opened startled Cameron from the wave of imaginable visions, bringing her back in the position of contemplating an issue unrolling painfully before her motionless stature. The sound of the office bag landing on the solid ground unceremoniously quickly, portraying the perfect crime of clumsiness, disturbed the peaceful stillness. A powerful agitation oppressed Chase's steps, as he headed towards the bedroom, eager to get rid of his wrinkled clothing, imprinted with a layer of dust combined with uneasy discontent.

Cameron sensed a new trouble dawning on their thickening mental horizon, and followed him to their matrimonial bedroom, finding him shirtless and slightly bent over by the portent full of possible danger.

"How is our little patient doing?" Cameron asked on a gentle, coaxing tone, with her lips pursued into a straight line. She was obviously under the effect of woe, vainly trying to get the conversation to a profound and eager hopefulness.

"He is great and stable. His parents were finally allowed to enter the post-surgery unit to see him," Chase deadpanned, clearly not showing effort in masking a puissant smile crossing over his face. "They looked so relieved, and for the first time, a family's thanks had meaning," He continued profusely, a quick flame of passion leaped into his eyes immediately, sending another prop to his faint heart which pulse was subsided by imaginative flashes.

A protest, a loud sheer of emotions trembled on her lips, ready to escape forever, to alterate the peace they once shared. A quiver of resistance ran through her as Chase took a sit on the soft armchair, looking unnaturally stressed. Cameron, ignoring the queer, uncomfortable perplexity invading her, decided to act, to end the chain of weakness.

She almost ran to place herself halfway on his tensed lap, a remarkable fusion of morality washing over her instantly. In an attempt to bring their trembling bodies into contact, she grabbed his smooth face in a vice grip, breathing in the satisfied sense of completeness radiating off his limbs, all expecting a solution of epic proportions.

A shiver of apprehension crisped her skin until courage settled in, a secret, sweeter and more savory than the open sky could whisper, escaped her lips, convincingly strong. They both knew they were united by love, one that would be confirmed by a thousand evanescent memories, ready to be unfurled.

 _"I want to make your dreams come true"._

 **Author's Note:** Merry Christmas (a little outmatched) to all the fellow shippers! A little one-shot to take the place of a gift until Santa arrives.

Read and Review! :*


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